Visual Art News - Criticism: January 2010 Archives

Dave Hickey at the Nasher Museum of Art, Duke University (Jan. 14, 2010)

I
was highly anticipating this lecture from Dave Hickey-- writer,
freelance art
and cultural critic, and MacArthur Fellowship winner among his many
claims to
fame. (As with any discussion of Warhol, the concept of fame itself
played an important part throughout the evening.) I had seen Dave
speak one time before, in conjunction with his Beau Monde biennial at
SITE Santa Fe,
so I was eager
to draw a comparison between the two talks.

But to be honest, I mostly
went
for the fun of just hanging out--for a short while and in a large crowd--in
Hickey's presence. This was, I knew, the best place to enjoy his
patented
irreverence for certain aspects of life, his deft ability to pontificate
on the
intellectual underpinnings of American culture and democracy, and also
where I
could hopefully catch a brief joyride in the critical musings which, in
the
title essay of his collection "Air Guitar," he describes as
"flurries of silent sympathetic gestures with nothing at their heart but
the memory of the music."

Not many "rock
star" art critics swing through the Raleigh-Durham area, so when it
happens, ya
gotta go. As a participant in the endeavor of criticism
myself, I must admit a deep regard for Dave's writing, his cultural
essays and "Art Issues" pieces in particular, for their accessibility,
range and, like them or not, his compelling critiques.